Crossroads

CROSSROADS

Home
Department

Sweet Serendipity

The gift of friendship

By Joyce Reehling

Finding true friends is seldom easy, but sometimes it feels like destiny. I walked onto a plane some 40 years ago on my way to a job in New Zealand and, as it turned out, a friend for life was about to drop into the seat next to me.

I confess, I generally approach seatmates with caution. I’ve had men confess to me that they were lying to their wives about a “business trip” when actually they were off to meet someone they’d fallen in “love” with a month before. I’ve sat next to a child who would only stop crying if I played Uno with him for the entire flight. And I’ve been beside women who have filled me in on the personal details surrounding the lives of allll their children and grandchildren. There are times when earbuds and an eyeshade are a godsend.

Years ago I was flying PanAm — when it still existed — in what was one of the last, great first class cabin experiences. My seatmate was a woman, and there were two men in front of us. Before we took off the man in the window seat in front of me asked his seatmate if he would switch with the lady next to me, as she was his wife and they would like to fly together. Of course, the fellow said. He would be happy to accommodate them. A short, four-way conversation about seat bookings ensued, bodies unbuckled and moved, followed by polite thank-yous all around.

In that moment I didn’t realize I’d hit the jackpot. Randy Boyd was now sitting next to me. The ice-breaking small talk and quick game of musical seats lead us to a deeper conversation that lasted the entire flight from New York to L.A. We laughed and enjoyed one another for hours.

What began as a lovely day of chatting and eating superior airline food — hard to believe now — ended with promises of visits. He wanted to meet me in the PanAm lounge on my layover back to NYC in a few weeks, back in the pre-9/11 days when such a thing was possible. We made plans for meeting the people we each loved. I had recently started dating the man who was to become my darling husband and, as Randy frequently came to NYC, I knew they would enjoy one another no end. And it all came true over nearly four decades of life’s fickle ups and downs.

COVID kept us apart, as it did so many, but we texted and talked online. Randy and I hadn’t seen one other in person since the summer of 2017 when I was visiting the United Kingdom with a friend and we rented a cottage from his sister Cindy and her husband, Nick, who live in Braybrooke with property in the Cotswolds. In 2024 my darling husband, Tony, was doing well with his cancer treatment until a single-cell form of cancer suddenly appeared and reversed our course. We could not know then that Tony would pass on July 4th of that year — blessedly peaceful and at home with me, as he wished. The word devastated doesn’t come close. My dear friends here were my salvation and family, both mine and Tony’s, held me up.

We had been invited to Randy and Mark’s wedding, though we knew Tony wasn’t well enough to make the trip, and it pained us not to be with them. When Tony died two weeks before the wedding, Randy could not bear to be away from me, and although he had so much still to do, he came for a week to uplift me and share in our mutual loss.

That love and empathy and caring was borne out of a simple seat assignment. On his visit, Randy fell in love with Pinehurst, Southern Pines and our whole area. He and Mark married and came for a visit in December, which is a great time to sell how wonderful it can be here. I decorated my house for Christmas — which I did not think I had the bandwidth to do — so that they might, crazy as it sounded, consider leaving Palm Springs for Pinehurst. It was worth a charm offensive.

And it worked. One of my dearest friends now lives a little over a mile away when he used to live 3,000 miles across the country, and Mark has added more joy to my life. I think Tony might have had a celestial hand in it.

If there is a lesson to be learned, it is this: Be open to the happy accidents of life. Be open to the joy that people can bring. You can never tell what little event might give you the chance to have a huge chunk of love deposited in your spiritual account. When you see an open door to a good soul walk through it. Your best friend may be right there in front of you. 

Art of the State

ART OF THE STATE

Home
Department

Pete Sack’s Second Act

Taking a turn as community leader

By Liza Roberts

A successful painter for nearly 30 years, Pete Sack has work featured in several corporate collections, including SAS Institute and Duke University Hospital. His resume includes dozens of prominent solo and group exhibitions and he’s currently got a waiting list for commissions.

Known for paintings that feature finely nuanced portraiture through an abstracted lens, Sack often obstructs faces with shapes and colors, combining pencil drawings with watercolor and, finally, oil paint. Sometimes two or three portraits of the same person are layered on top of each other, just enough expertly wrought detail to recognize who it is.

His completely abstract paintings are no less contemplative. Thought Patterns is a series “created with the premise that we begin every day as a new person,” he says. Depicted as layers of spheres and ovals of various hue, some are cool and moody, others buoyant, a few bright and jangled. The resulting paintings reflect the moods and thoughts of the days he made them. “Each day we are reacting to fresh thoughts, actions and environments,” he says. With a limited palette and the self-imposed requirement that he complete each piece within a single day, the works are “fully representative of a particular moment in time and take into account the deeply layered experience each individual has with the present moment.”

Sack’s path began at the Visual Art Exchange — a nonprofit hub for nurturing, connecting and showcasing artists — when he landed in Raleigh in 1988 after earning his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at East Carolina University. “When I moved here, the VAE was where you learned how to be an artist in this area,” Sack says. It’s also where he and many others had their art exhibited publicly for the first time. “It was where you got your pieces on the wall.” 

An emerging artist residency at Artspace and a full-time studio there followed, which further engaged him with the downtown art community. When the creative space Anchorlight opened on S. Bloodworth Street, he moved his practice there. Then he spent nearly five years as an artist in residence at SAS Institute in Cary, where he made as many as 150 works of art for the growing software company’s walls. These days, Sack has a studio on Hargett Street and a dedicated roster of collectors.

None of it happened by sitting back and waiting for things to come to him. For years, Sack worked to create opportunities for himself, finding creative ways to get his work seen outside the gallery system, including working with real estate developers and interior designers making art that he could be proud of while still suiting their purposes.

The spirit of those efforts expanded to the wider community in 2023 when he and three other established Raleigh artists, Jean Gray Mohs, Lamar Whidbee and Daniel Kelly, began convening groups of fellow artists to discuss the declining number of exhibition opportunities and spaces to gather and experiment downtown. The result was the creation of The Grid Project, an art collective focused on mounting pop-up exhibitions. With the long-term loan by ceramic artist Mike Cindric of his former studio (now called Birdland), The Grid Project has mounted 10 shows in the last two years, exhibiting work by 25 artists. Those exhibits spawned the creation of what Sack and Mohs call the Boylan Arts District.

The calling on everything Sack’s learned over the last 27 years about what it means to be an artist in his community.

In an unexpected turn of events, Sack was tapped last spring to co-direct the Visual Art Exchange with Mohs. The two aim to revive the 45-year-old institution, bringing it back to its roots as a resource for artists, a place for them to learn the practical business of being an artist, connect with other artists, and show their work.

A rebirth is in order, because among other challenges, the pandemic hit the VAE hard. By one estimate cited by Sack, the nonprofit gave out as much as $300,000 in funds directly to support artists during that time. The financial hit proved significant, and the organization moved out of its brick-and-mortar home in late April as a cost-saving measure. Sack and Mohs were recruited by the board and took the reins in June.

“As we move into this new chapter, our immediate focus will be on strengthening the internal structure of the organization,” the co-directors said in an October email to stakeholders. At the time, they were full-time volunteers; the VAE had just $7,000 in the bank. They have since held a series of listening sessions to gather input about the organization’s future direction.

“We need to temper expectations,” Sack says, “and let people know that this is the reality. But we aren’t going anywhere. We’re going to see this through.”

In the meantime, they’re doing what they can, where they are, with what they’ve got. In October, they filled the empty windows of the former CVS at the corner of Hargett and Fayetteville streets with art by Renzo Ortega and Lee Nisbet, working with Empire Properties to turn what was a dark corner into an art beacon. VAE is providing small stipends for the artists and calling the effort “StreetFrame.” Sack says they hope to replicate it in other empty downtown storefronts.

In October, under the VAE banner, the duo opened Echoes of Modernism, an exhibition examining how modernist architecture shapes our political, social and economic lives. Curated by artist Sam van Strein, it included work by Amba Sayal-Bennett, Daniel Rich, Frances Lightbound and van Strein.

Meanwhile, Sack’s art has its own demands. Last year, he had back-to-back shows for six months at a stretch and worried about “saturating” the market.

The demands of his work with VAE have given him time to “take a step back, to recalibrate” his art, and to think about where to take it next. “My sketchbook is filling up, I am building up the reserves, and I’m excited to see where the work goes,” he says. “Toggling between the figurative and the abstract is still something that I’m pushing. At the end of the day, I’m always going to be an artist. I’m building up to something bigger.”

And despite the obvious challenges, that same spirit is fueling his work with VAE. Sack says he’s determined to make it indispensable to the next generation of Raleigh artists.

“Years ago, I would never have thought I’d be in this position, just because it’s not something I ever wanted to do,” he says. “But the writing is on the wall that nobody’s coming to save us. We have to save ourselves.”

Golftown Journal

GOLFTOWN JOURNAL

Home
Department

Warming the Insides

Bowled over by red or green

By Lee Pace

It’s time for the ChapStick, wool stocking caps, corduroy trousers and a pocket full of handwarmers. Behold the dormant Bermuda, embrace the brisk winds and the low Southern sun. John Updike had the right idea: “Golf feels, on the frost-stiffened fairways, reduced to its austere and innocent essence.”

And the proper nourishment after a round of winter golf? A bowl o’ red, of course.

Oh, it’s a thing.

There’s a comfort station on the sixth hole of Bluejack National in Montgomery, Texas, that serves chili made of four cuts of beef. There’s a club in Decatur, Alabama, that for 20 years each December stages a combination “Superintendent’s Revenge” golf tournament coupled with a chili cookoff, with more than a dozen recipes entered. And Scottie Scheffler served Texas-style chili at the 2025 Champions Dinner at the Masters, replete with cheddar cheese, jalapeños and corn chips.

Two new dining establishments in the Sandhills each have their entry into the winter chili sweepstakes.

PL8TE/Southern Table opened in May 2025 at the Pinehurst No. 8 clubhouse, following the 2022 renovation of the golf course and coinciding with the opening of five luxury cottages on the premises. The new restaurant offers a fresh take on upscale Southern cuisine — staples with a modern twist, such as shrimp and grits with roasted succotash and BBQ-glazed pork chops with Cheerwine sauce. 

Station 21 is the new Southwest-themed food and beverage facility at Pinehurst Sandmines, the restaurant so-named because 21 is the sum of 10 & 11 (the Tom Doak-designed No. 10 opened in May 2024, and the Coore & Crenshaw No. 11 will follow in the fall of 2027), and “station” hearkens to the Sandmines’ history of being a mining site for sand that was transported out via railroad cars. The menu includes appetizers like Texas Hill Country quail knots, hand-held offerings such as bison sliders, and full-plate specialties like authentic Mexican tamales with shrimp or pork.

And both PL8TE and Station 21 have chili offerings of decidedly contrasting colors, textures and tastes.

PL8TE’s version of “green chili” is built around pork and a host of green-hued ingredients — green tomatoes, tomatillos, cilantro, lime and green chilies.

Station 21 goes for “chili con carne,” a thick red elixir of brisket and short rib with beans, tomatoes, chipotle peppers and Guinness beer.

Michael Morris, chef de cuisine at both facilities, says the two versions are made in batches of six gallons at a time.

“Our chili recipes are built on layers,” he says. “The chili con carne uses equal parts brisket and short rib plus dark beer and chipotle for a smoky, beef-forward depth. The green chili is a dual-pork (loin and butt), tomatillo-based verde with plenty of roasted poblanos, fresh cilantro and a bright hit of lemon to lift it. Both are made in large batches and finished slowly to a simmer phase so the flavors meld — they’re approachable but rooted in classic technique.”

One interesting question on the version served at Station 21 is that it includes beans — some argue that a true Texas chili is comprised of meat and spices and nothing else.

“On the age-old question, we keep one foot in each camp,” Morris says. “Our chili con carne leans traditional Texas-style — heavy on the smoked meats, rich ancho and chipotle depth, Guinness for body, so the beans are there mostly to balance texture, not dominate it. Our green chili goes the opposite direction: bright, tangy, built on tomatillos, poblanos and slow-cooked pork. It’s meant to taste like the Southwest in a bowl. We build both around layers of flavor instead of heat for heat’s sake — beer reduction, citrus and base stocks to give them backbone without overpowering the ingredients.”

Both PL8TE and Station 21 are the result of Pinehurst owner Bob Dedman Jr. believing several years ago that the dining facilities across the resort had evolved into a sameness. Creating a barbecue and craft beer emporium in the village of Pinehurst (Pinehurst Brewery) and purchasing an existing upscale Italian restaurant (Villaggio at the Magnolia Inn) were major steps toward solving that issue. Then, in 2022, Dedman hired a restaurant industry veteran in Gonzague Muchery to further develop the initiative.

Muchery is a native of France, grew up in his family’s restaurant business and has spent 45 years in the culinary arena across the United States — from Ritz Carltons to a five-star venue on Amelia Island to high-end cruise ships. The first project under Muchery’s purview was the Carolina Vista Lounge, the restaurant and bar in the Carolina Hotel that replaced the Ryder Cup Lounge in the fall of 2023. The space was reimagined from a casual dining venue to an upscale bar offering dishes drawn from North America (buttermilk fried chicken sliders and double-patty grilled burgers) to South America (chili salt pork rinds and empanadas with andouille sausage). 

Then came PL8TE and Station 21, the latter just opening in September.

“The concept at Station 21 is to curate an experience completely different from anything at Pinehurst,” says Muchery, the director of resort food and beverage for Pinehurst Inc. “The Southwest theme pays homage to the Texas heritage of the Dedman family (Pinehurst’s owner since 1984) and to the history of this property. This land has been used for hunting, so we have quail on the menu. One part of the No. 10 course was once a peach orchard, so we have peach salsa and a peach and chipotle rub for chicken, and a peach ice cream sandwich.” 

Muchery’s French heritage comes through as he speaks of the marriage of recreation, food, drink, friendship, nature and the five senses at Pinehurst Sandmines and Station 21.

“Having an emotional connection with each facility is very important,” he says. “You come to this wonderful golf course, you walk it and feel the ground beneath you, then you come together after it’s over and talk about what a great experience you had. You have something to eat. You have a drink. In cooler weather you sit around the fire pit. You have a cigar and reflect on the day, you enjoy the moment. You think, ‘Oh wow, what a good time.’ We’re establishing the formula and culture for the next 30 to 40 years.” 

As for the next three months, it will be cold and windy. The hands will go numb, the nostrils will go runny.

But take heart in a bowl of hearty sustenance. Color me happy — red or green, either is perfectly fine.

Omnivorous Reader

OMNIVOROUS READER

Home
Department

Finding Everyman

Breaking a 19th century code

By Anne Blythe

Anybody who delights in being an attic archaeologist and parting the curtains of cobwebs in dim, dank corners to excavate layers of dust and forgotten family history will find much to like in Cipher: Decoding My Ancestor’s Scandalous Secret Diaries.

Jeremy B. Jones, an associate English professor at Western Carolina University, was digging around in boxes at his grandmother’s house one day when he came across a newspaper clipping that proved to be a golden ticket taking him back in time to the 19th century and the fascinating life of an ordinary man.

That man was William Thomas Prestwood, Jones’ great-great-great-great-grandfather, who had traveled many of the same lands and roads Jones has. Learning the details of his kinsman six generations removed was anything but typical family lore handed down from one generation to the next. Prestwood, as the newspaper clipping from 1979 revealed, had been a prolific diarist, but not the kind of journal keeper who seemed intent on preserving his life story beyond his death 166 years ago.

The details of the daily life of this militia man, Appalachian farmer, teacher, philosopher and prolific philanderer might have been lost to the annals of time had a man not salvaged a stash of Prestwood’s hand-sewn journals from a Wadesboro house scheduled for demolition in 1975. Those notebooks weren’t filled with the elegant and elaborate penmanship of the 19th century. They were written in code, a series of shapes, numbers and symbols that added an element of intrigue that eventually landed them on the desk of a state archivist.

Unable to solve the mystery of what the journals’ author had written, the archivist copied a few pages and sent them off to a National Security Agency cryptanalyst who had retired in the Appalachian Mountains. The expert in encryption and decryption quickly cracked the code, eventually transcribing the journals’ pages, revealing the many brief but telling details of an Everyman’s life in the Carolinas.

Prestwood wrote about collecting turkey eggs, hunting for a horse on the loose, farming, visiting neighbors, drinking rum, eating watermelon, playing music, strife with his father, the births of his children, deaths in the family, dreams, and his many sexual conquests and unrequited longings worthy of Tom Jones. He gives a glimpse of a public hanging and even the eclipse of 1821 — not with the flourish of a wordsmith but in the short sentences or fragments of an ordinary person.

“In 1859, a forgettable man died,” Jones writes in the opening sentence of Cipher’s first chapter. “He left behind bedclothes, a spyglass, cooking pots and an umbrella. He left history books and algebra books and mineralogy books and Greek grammar books and astrology books.” He lists the daughters and sons who preceded Prestwood in death and the debt he left behind, a sum that his “landholdings and scattershot of personal property — sold for a total of $11.94” didn’t cover. Prestwood, Jones writes, “entered the ground penniless.”

The journals he left behind, the treasure trove that Jones learned about from the yellowed 1979 newspaper article in The Asheville Citizen-Times — have proven to be priceless, though. They give a glimpse, as the codebreaker wrote, “of the very essence of Everyman’s life from the cradle to the grave.”

Jones toggles between Prestwood’s life and his own, turning to archives, property records and other historical accounts to help flesh out his ancestor’s story. Occasionally, he fills in gaps with his own imagination and hypotheticals to further a narrative that includes slave ownership and womanizing.

Jones struggled with whether he should lay bare the details of a long-dead man’s thoughts and his comings and goings. After all, those specifics were cloaked in a code cracked more than a century after the last journal entry.

“He’d blanketed his shin-skinning and corn-planting and woman-laying in code for a reason, and what right did I have to come along two hundred years later and run my fingers along the edges of his life in a library in the middle of the state?” Jones asked himself while viewing the diaries in a special library collection in Raleigh. “Was I shrinking his life by bringing it out into the open, making him smaller than he ever was, less of a man?”

In Cipher, Jones not only has brought Prestwood to life again — scandalous warts and all — he has created a memoir of sorts, a depiction of his own everyday life exploring today’s connection to this country’s complicated past. Jones has given us yet another chapter in Everyman history, an interesting read for anyone who likes to look at what America once was and has become. 

Out of the Blue

OUT OF THE BLUE

Home
Department

Double the Spirit

Warm, kind and generous

By Deborah Salomon

By rights, this column should be brimming with “Christmas spirit.’’ But Santa looks worried. Can the “Christmas spirit” survive with Yule merch suffering tariff shock?

I am the product of a mixed marriage. My father grew up in the Lower East Side Manhattan ghetto of poor Russian and Polish immigrants — all ultra-orthodox Jews. He rejected the strict confines but loved the culture, especially the food. My mother was raised strict Southern Baptist, in Greensboro: no dancing, playing cards or drinking.

They both loved Christmas — the gifts, a big tree with lights, the cookies and fruitcake. Who wouldn’t love the Christmas pageant at Radio City Music Hall with a live donkey, and the animated windows at the Fifth Avenue department stores? Maybe this wasn’t proper but it sure was fun, especially with a new Mary Poppins book under the tree.

I never heard of Hanukkah, or latkes (potato pancakes fried in symbolic oil), or lighting candles for eight days to remember a brave military leader and the miracle of a lantern burning eight days on enough oil for only one.

That changed when we moved to Asheville, which had a vibrant Jewish community. We joined the Reform Temple. I attended religious school.

I married into a relaxed Jewish family and lived for decades in an orthodox Montreal neighborhood. I learned all the intricacies of orthodoxy, but our family was staunchly Reform. Plenty of latkes. No Christmas. But the two holidays, celebrating vastly different events but often falling within the same week, shared one thing: spirit. A spirit more ecumenical than divisive. A happy, respectful spirit. A spirit that addresses the secular and the sacred.

By the ’60s,“Happy Hanukkah’’ had joined the American holiday lexicon. Christian friends enjoyed chanting the alliterative words without knowing the backstory . . . or the preferred spelling. Everybody enjoyed the enthusiasm, the small gifts, one on each of eight nights. Better yet were the close family moments with grandparents and cousins. In other words, the Hannukah “spirit.”

This year Hanukkah ends a few days before Christmas. But a kind spirit is not lit by candles or Rudolph. Certainly not by the latest techno-gadget which will, like those must-have Cabbage Patch dolls, fade from favor. I don’t measure the Christmas spirit in cash. It could be an outing for a senior who no longer drives. Or gently used children’s coats, freshly dry cleaned, in a zippered hanging bag. Maybe an IOU for a dozen rides to church, or a tabletop tree decorated with tiny lights and peppermint Life Savers. I once had a friend who gave out complimentary car washes; another, free babysitting. In many cities Jewish organizations take over volunteer jobs at hospitals on Chistmas day, while church choirs carol at nursing homes.

The Christmas spirit is warm and kind and generous no matter how it’s implemented, and by whom. Participate. Enjoy. Finish off the crown roast with crispy potato latkes. Then pick a language and say a prayer for a better year ahead.

Focus on Food

FOCUS ON FOOD

Home
Department

Spectacular Speculaas

Cookies for St. Nicholas

Story and Photograph by Rose Shewey

Speculaas cookies are works of art with a wonderfully charming backstory. Not quite as popular as gingerbread — unjustly so, I might add — speculaas were originally made with hand-carved wooden molds that produce filigran shapes with extraordinary relief details. That’s how I make mine — but sit tight, there are other options for those of you without fancy mold contraptions.

The original cookies depicted the story of St. Nicholas, the bishop of Myra (modern day Turkey), who is said to have brought treats to children in December. St. Nicholas was known as the “Speculator” (overseer or observer), and legend has it that in the evenings he would peer (as in, speculate) through the windows of the poor to see who needed help. This may explain both the curious name and why the speculaas is a customary St. Nicholas Day sweet treat, especially in the Netherlands, where these cookies likely originated. And it’s probably why the most famous speculaas cookie these days depicts a windmill.

Known as speculaas in Dutch, spéculoos in French or spekulatius in German, you might encounter any of the three names while on the hunt for recipes or store-bought cookies. These sweet treats have as much tradition and lovely, wintery warm spices as gingerbread but are much easier to prepare (gingerbread dough is traditionally started two months ahead of time and left to rest) and, dare I say, more refined and delicious.

In place of the wooden molds, lots of folks use a carved or embossed rolling pin or cookie cutters. The simplest way of preparing these is, however, to roll out the dough and slice it into smaller rectangles, which can be decorated with a piece or two of sliced almonds. The recipe I use is adapted from the German Baker’s Guild, which represents a basic version with room for growth — adjust the amount of spices used or add some of your own. To make butter speculaas, increase the amount of butter by 100 grams and add an extra egg. 

Speculaas Cookies

(Makes about 40 pieces)

150 grams butter, room temperature

1 egg

110 grams brown sugar

Zest of 1 lemon

60 grams almond flour

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom

300 grams wheat flour

Directions

Cream the butter, egg and sugar with an electric mixer for at least 8-10 minutes until light and fluffy. Stir in the lemon zest, spices and ground almond, then add flour into the mixture. Knead all the ingredients together by hand to form a firm dough. Shape the dough into two balls, wrap them in cling film, and chill for about 1 hour. Remove one portion of dough from the refrigerator. If using a speculaas mold, tear off small sections of the dough and press them into the lightly floured molds. Use a knife or a piece of thread to cut excess dough from the mold to create a nice, flat cookie backside and smooth edges, then gently tap the mold on your working surface until the cookies pop out. Transfer to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. If using cookie cutters, roll out the dough thinly (about 4 millimeters) between two sheets of parchment paper. Dust lightly with flour. Cut out shapes and set them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. If using a speculaas (or embossed) rolling pin, gently but firmly roll over the rolled out dough to cut out shapes. Carefully separate the speculaas shapes using a butter or pastry knife and transfer them to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Knead the leftover dough together again and roll it out anew. Chill cookies for about 2 hours before baking. Heat the oven to 350F and bake for about 8-10 minutes, but keep a watchful eye on the cookies, they burn quickly. The cookies will seem soft right after baking but will harden once they cool. Repeat with the remaining dough.

The Naturalist

THE NATURALIST

Home
Department

A Few Magical Moments

Sighting a hawk as white as snow

Story and Photographs by Todd Pusser

Several years ago, on a crisp December morning, I found myself traveling down the dusty backroads of Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge under a brilliant blue sky. I had a few hours to kill before a planned meeting at the nearby Outer Banks History Center and thought a drive through the refuge might yield a sighting of a black bear or a river otter — and if I was really lucky, perhaps an endangered red wolf.

About a mile into my drive, I noticed a large white bird lift off the ground from the middle of a freshly plowed field and fly toward some tall pine trees several hundred yards out in front of my car. Based on its size and stiff-winged flight, I could tell it was some sort of bird of prey, but with its unusual white coloration, I could not readily make out the species. Perhaps, I thought, it was a snowy owl, a spectacular resident of Arctic climes, that occasionally ventures south to North Carolina during winter months. 

As I pulled my car up to the pine trees, I was stunned to see something much rarer than a snowy owl. Off to the side of the dirt road, sitting on a branch of a tall loblolly, was a white red-tailed hawk. Its luminous feathers contrasted sharply with the golden needles of the pine and the intense Carolina blue sky. In eastern North America, adult red-tailed hawks typically possess brown backs and white bellies and chests lined by dark streaks. Their tail is brick red, hence the name. The hawk in the pine was anything but typical. It was stunning. In the bright morning light, the pale hawk gave off a surreal, almost otherworldly glow.

Red-tailed hawks are notoriously skittish, and I figured the bird would fly away when I lowered my car window and pointed a large telephoto lens at it. To my surprise, the hawk remained focused on the field from whence it flew and paid me little attention. As I fumbled with my camera settings, adjusting the aperture and shutter speed, the hawk glanced occasionally in my direction. Still, the bird held its position and continued to stare out into the field. 

Unusually white animals have captured human imagination for time immemorial and are frequently viewed as omens of good fortune. Among certain Native American cultures, a white buffalo represents hope and harmony among all people and are considered the most sacred of animals. In Thailand, some believe that white elephants contain the souls of people who have crossed over into the spirit world. In Celtic and English folklore, white deer are frequently endowed with supernatural powers and magical abilities. Exceptionally white animals have even permeated popular culture — none more so than Captain Ahab’s great nemesis, the white sperm whale Moby Dick.

Studying the details of the pale red-tailed hawk more closely through my telephoto lens, I realized the bird was not completely white. Numerous light brown feathers were scattered about its wings and head. Zooming in on the hawk’s eye on the back of my camera’s LCD, I noticed its black pupil, a feature that told me that the bird was not an albino. True albino birds lack any pigment in their feathers and have pink eyes. Genetic mutations that cause abnormally white feathers in birds are numerous and are not well understood. Without a thorough analysis of its blood, the condition causing the unusual white coloration of the hawk would remain unknown.

After nearly 15 minutes of me taking photos, something finally caught the hawk’s attentive gaze. With a crouch and a quick spread of its wings, the raptor launched off the pine and flew low over the ground to the far side of the field. Like some ghostly apparition, the white red-tail disappeared over the distant trees and was gone.

All I have to prove this magical encounter actually happened are a few pixels stored on a hard drive and the pale image etched permanently into my memory bank. To this day, the hawk remains one of the most spectacular and beautiful birds I have ever encountered.

Southwords

SOUTHWORDS

Home
Department

Santa’s Coming, Regardless

By Robert Inman

It starts every year, without fail, the day after Thanksgiving. Grownups begin to threaten young people over Santa Claus. The air is full of dire predictions about what might happen Christmas Eve if children aren’t something close to saintly. It is the bludgeon used to produce clean plates at mealtime, tidy rooms, impeccable manners and timely homework.

Of course, adults have been putting the evil eye on children’s behavior since time immemorial. My grandmother, for example, had a special word of terror for young folks who trampled her flowers, tracked mud on her rug, or swung too high in her porch swing. “Nasty stinkin’ young’uns,” she’d bark, “I’m gonna pinch your heads off.” Mama Cooper was a sweet and kind person who never would have pinched the head off a radish, much less a child, but she could strike fear into her grandchildren. We were careful around her flowers, her rug and her porch swing.

So the grownup weapon of fear is a time-honored tradition. But the direst predictions of ruin and misfortune, it seems, are always saved for the Christmas season. “If you don’t clean up your plate, Santa Claus won’t come.” “Act ugly one more time, buster, and you’ll find a bag of switches under the tree for you on Christmas morning.” Well, baloney.

I came to my senses about the Santa Claus business when I met Jake Tibbetts, a crotchety old newspaper editor who appeared in my imagination one day and then took over the pages of my first novel, Home Fires Burning. Jake had a built-in bull-hockey detector, and he could spot nonsense a mile away. Jake’s grandson Lonnie lived with Jake and his wife, Pastine, and when Christmas rolled around, Mama Pastine put the pox on Lonnie about Santa’s upcoming visit.

At the breakfast table one morning, Lonnie let a mild oath slip from his 10-year-old lips. Mama Pastine pounced. “Santa Claus has no truck with blasphemers,” she said.

“Hogwash,” Daddy Jake snorted. “Santa Claus makes no moral judgments. His sole responsibility is to make young folks happy. Even bad ones. Even TERRIBLE ones.”

“Then why,” Lonnie asked, “does he bring switches to some kids?”

Jake replied, “This business about switches is pure folklore. Did you ever know anybody who really got switches for Christmas? Even one?”

Lonnie couldn’t think of a single one.

“Right,” said Daddy Jake. “I have been on this Earth for 64 years, and I have encountered some of the meanest, vilest, smelliest, most undeserving creatures the Good Lord ever allowed to creep and crawl. And not one of them ever got switches for Christmas. Lots of ’em were told they’d get switches. Lots of ’em laid in their beds trembling through Christmas Eve, just knowing they’d find a stocking full of hickory branches come morning. But you know what they found? Goodies. Even the worst of ’em got some kind of goodies. And for one small instant, every child who lives and breathes is happy and good, even if he is as mean as a snake every other instant. That’s what Santa Claus is for, anyhow.”

Well, Daddy Jake said it better than I ever could. I believe with all my heart that he is right, just as I have always believed fervently in Santa Claus and still do.

I believed in Santa Claus even through the Great Fort Bragg Misbehavior of 1953. My father was stationed at Fort Bragg with the Army, and I was in the fourth grade at the post elementary school. The day before school let out for the Christmas holidays, Santa Claus landed on the playground in an Army helicopter. It was, to me and my classmates, something akin to the Second Coming. When we went out to welcome Santa, the teachers stationed the first- through fourth-graders on one side of the playground and the fifth- and sixth-graders on the other. When Santa’s chopper landed, I learned why. We little kids were yelling our heads off for Santa to leave us some goodies under the tree a few nights hence. Across the way, the fifth- and sixth-graders were yelling, “Fake! Fake!”

Some of my classmates were crestfallen. It never fazed me. I figured those big kids were wrong then, and still do. Santa Claus is for real. Just look in a kid’s eyes and you’ll see him.

(By the way, I’m sure the fifth- and sixth-graders didn’t get switches for Christmas. Maybe they should have, but they didn’t.)

Grownups are wrong, too, when they threaten kids with the loss of Santa. Daddy Jake was right. We adult types need to grant the kids their unfettered moment of magic. If they act up, threaten to pinch their heads off. But leave Santa out of it. 

Bookshelf

BOOKSHELF

Home
Department

December Books

FICTION

Burner: And Other Stories, by Katrina Denza

Denza writes about women in conflict: attempting to woo a man via a burner phone; discovering the best friendships are those grounded in reality; subscribing to a hologram service to speak to a deceased husband; reclaiming power only to realize power is an illusion; discovering there is no safe haven; confronting the frustrations of being an artist; and reckoning with mistakes made as a mother. Wrestling with connections and disconnections, highs and lows, and the vagaries of modernity, Burner and Other Stories touches how we live.

NONFICTION

Van Gogh: The Pop Up Book

See the vibrant artistry of Vincent van Gogh burst into life through dazzling three-dimensional interpretations of five of his most celebrated works. This imaginative book transforms renowned masterpieces into interactive pop-up creations, offering a new and tactile appreciation of one of history’s most visionary artists. Each scene draws readers into Van Gogh’s universe, revealing the swirling night sky of The Starry Night in dramatic relief; the serene intimacy of The Bedroom; and the vibrant colors of Wheatfield with Cypresses. The street scene of Café Terrace at Night and the delicate beauty of Almond Blossom emerge in meticulous detail, emphasizing the dynamic movement and profound emotion of his technique. These exquisite pop-ups amplify the expressive contours and vibrant hues that define his genius, bringing Van Gogh’s unparalleled vision to life in an unforgettable way.

Wings: The Story of a Band on the Run, by Paul McCartney

Drawn from over 500,000 words of interviews with McCartney, family, band members and other key participants, Wings recounts — now with a half-century’s perspective — the musical odyssey taken by a man searching for his identity in the aftermath of The Beatles’ breakup. Soon joined by his wife — American photographer Linda McCartney — on keyboard and vocals, drummer Denny Seiwell, and guitarist Denny Laine, McCartney sowed the seeds for a new band that would later provide the soundtrack of the decade. The narrative begins when a 27-year-old superstar fled with his new wife to a remote sheep farm in Scotland amid a sea of legal and personal rows. The setting gave McCartney time to create, and it was there where this new band emerged. Wings follows the group as they play unannounced shows at university halls, tour in a sheared-off double-decker bus with their children, survive a robbery on the streets of Nigeria, and eventually perform blockbuster stadium shows on their world tour, all while producing some of the most enduring music of the time. Introduced with a personal, heartfelt foreword by McCartney, the volume contains 150 black and white and color photographs, many previously unseen, as well as timelines, a gigography and a full discography.

Black, White, Colored: The Hidden Story of an Insurrection, a Family, a Southern Town, and Identity in America, by Lauretta Malloy Noble, LeeAnét Noble

In the late 19th century, Laurinburg, North Carolina, was a beacon of racial calm — a place where Blacks and whites could live and work together. Black families like the Malloys became landlords, business owners and doctors, thriving together and changing the economic landscape. But that progress was shattered on the eve of Election Day, 1898, when supremacist groups launched a bloody attack, forcing Laurinburg’s Black citizens to flee. With meticulous research drawn from sources including The New York Age and census records, the mother and daughter authors — descendants of the town’s early Black leaders — uncover the trailblazing achievements of their ancestors, piecing together proof of Black resilience in a region shaped by profound adversity whose contributions extended beyond Laurinburg to institutions including Howard University and Meharry Medical College.

CHILDREN’S BOOKS

The Millicent Quibb School of Etiquette for Young Ladies of Mad Science: Secrets of the Purple Pearl, by Kate McKinnon

From the Saturday Night Live legend comes this highly anticipated second about mad science, three peculiar sisters, and the mysterious Millicent Quibb! The Porch Sisters are in trouble. It’s summertime in Antiquarium, and everyone has flocked to the majestic lakeside Purple Pearl Hotel, including the Krenetics Research Association, a nefarious group of mad scientists. They haven’t given up on resurrecting their fearsome leader, Talon Sharktūth, and now they’re hot on the trail of the legendary Purple Pearl, a source of power that is rumored to be lost at the bottom of Lake Kagloopy. But Gertrude, Eugenia and Dee-Dee are on to them and their mentor, Millicent Quibb, has a plan! Is it a good plan? Hard to say! But it does involve finding a mysterious creature called a Shrimpmaid and retrieving the pearl before the KRA gets its evil hands on it! (Ages 8 – 12.)

The Apprenticeship of Andrew Weyth: Painting a Family Legacy, by Gene Barretta

Before Andrew Wyeth found his creative voice, he was a boy growing up in an artistic family, spending his time in rural Pennsylvania and Maine. Andy, as he was called by his family, was trained by his father, renowned artist N.C. Wyeth, but they didn’t always see eye to eye. Pa wanted his son to fill his compositions with exciting characters and places. But to Andy, the most exciting stories to paint were the ones he lived every day, that featured the familiar people and places he loved most. (Ages 5 – 9.)

Hometown

HOMETOWN

Home
Department

Christmas in a Nutshell

The spirit lingers in little things

By Bill Fields

Most of the presents I received long ago, on those Christmas mornings of excitement and eggnog which seemed as if they would never arrive, are long gone. The Rock ’Em, Sock ’Em Robots, those red and blue plastic heavyweights, haven’t gone 12 rounds in years. No rough representations of cats or dogs have appeared in squiggly lines on the Etch A Sketch in forever. The future-telling of a Magic 8-Ball is far, far in the past.

But my “Christmas Nutshell Library” still sits on a shelf, a symbol of the season to be checked out each December, more than 60 years since it appeared under our tree and I marked it as mine, the black letters forming my name on the slipcase now very faint or claimed by time.

Growing up, I loved little things: a 10-cent water pistol that could be hidden in a palm; pocket-sized checkers set; “Tot 50” Swingline stapler about the size of my index finger; Matchbox cars that could race on a windowsill.

Given that the volumes in the holiday collection each measured just 2 7/8 x 3 7/16 inches, they were right up my alley. Talk about truth in advertising — the $2.95 set, published by Harper & Row in 1963, was promoted as “four small books for small people.” The Lilliputian release was Harper & Row’s follow-up to the 1962 publication of the popular “Nutshell Library” by noted children’s author and illustrator Maurice Sendak. The Christmas-themed encore was entrusted to another giant of the genre, Hilary Knight.

Knight, whose father, Clayton, and mother, Katherine, were talented illustrators and immersed him in art when he was a child, was well known by the early 1960s for having illustrated author Kay Thompson’s 1955 Eloise: A Book for Precocious Grownups, about a mischievous 6-year-old girl who lives with her nanny, dog and turtle on “the tippy-top floor” of the Plaza Hotel in New York City. The character, based on an imaginary friend Thompson had as a child, was further developed in three Eloise book sequels by Thompson and Knight in the late 1950s: Eloise in Paris, Eloise at Christmastime and Eloise in Moscow.

For the “Christmas Nutshell Library” Knight drew the artwork for Clement Moore’s classic The Night Before Christmas. He wrote and illustrated the other three books: A Firefly in a Fir Tree, a parody of “The Twelve Days of Christmas”; Angels & Berries & Candy Canes, an alphabet book; and A Christmas Stocking Story, accurately described in one 1963 review as “a merry mix-up yarn.”

I enjoyed the tiny books, again and again, across numerous childhood Christmases. The missing dust jackets are a casualty of how often I read them each holiday season. One particularly loosened binding, though, reveals my favorite.

A Christmas Stocking Story is the charming, rhyming tale of eight creatures — Stork, Hippo, Lion, Fish, Elephant, Snake, Fox and Bug — to whom Santa Claus delivers ill-suited gifts to their stockings. “Fish fell in a solemn hush,” Knight wrote, “finding hers held comb and brush.”

But the recipients go from glum to giddy when they “found each had what the next preferred” and remedy the situation by swapping presents. Among the happy do-overs:

“Stork, who suffered from sore throats, wore his sleeve with winter coats.”

“Hippo, hiding giggling fits, shyly showed her lacy mitts.”

“Snake, who yearned for gaudy things, slipped into her diamond rings.”

Knight’s skilled hand brought the critters’ emotions — dejection at first, followed by delight — to vivid life. His 1964 Where’s Wallace? is the tale of an orangutan who repeatedly flees the zoo and has escapades around the city. Young readers were challenged to find the ape in Knight’s detailed panoramic illustrations nearly a quarter-century before kids began searching for a human character in Where’s Waldo?

Over a career that extended into his 90s, Knight has illustrated more than 50 books, created artwork for magazine and record album covers, advertisements, greeting cards and Broadway shows.

“I got a lot of work to do,” Knight told Forbes.com when he was 90. “I have to take care of myself because I have to live at least another 10 years.”

The man who provided children plenty of pleasure celebrated his 99th birthday last month.